Lover Be Mine: A Legendary Lovers Novel (8 page)

At the same time, one of his hands slid down her back to her derriere, drawing their
loins together, turning the sparks between them to flame.

The moan that rose to Sophie’s throat was quite audible in the quiet hush of the office.
Lord Jack obviously heard it, for his marvelous mouth finally broke off … although
he didn’t fully release her.

Instead, his eyes smiled into hers as he raised a finger to trace her wet lips in
a delicate caress. “You see my point, darling. There must be something to our legendary
lovers tale after all.”

Sophie closed her eyes, fighting the emotional aftershock of his kiss. Why did her
heart lurch so wildly at his embrace? She felt shaken, dazed, while a smoldering excitement
raged in her blood.

Legendary lover, indeed
. He was so intoxicating, he took her breath away.

She shook herself and forcibly opened her eyes. The man’s virility devastated her
senses and stole all her common sense, drat him. Even worse, he made her yearn for
things she couldn’t have.

She ought to know better. Merely because he was sinfully, heart-meltingly seductive
was not sufficient reason to lose her head. Especially since she had a prime example
to serve as a warning—her maid Martha. At least she now understood how easily Martha
had succumbed to seduction and become a fallen woman. The girl had confessed to being
so overwhelmed by desire, she simply couldn’t help herself.

Sophie couldn’t help herself either at the moment. Not when Lord Jack stirred such
passionate, heart-pounding desire inside her.

“I promised myself I would never let you kiss me again.…” she said in a low rasp.

“Why not?”

“You know why. Because it could never lead anywhere—or at least nowhere good.”

“But you cannot deny what you feel. You will never know that kind of fire with your
duke, I’ll lay money on it.”

His assertion unsettled her because she knew it was true. She wanted to marry for
love. She wanted to know passion in her marriage bed. And yet her wishes couldn’t
be allowed to matter. Despite the seductive notion that Lord Jack could be her ideal
match. Despite the fact that she had far more in common with him than with the much
older Duke of Dunmore.

As Sophie argued silently with herself, Lord Jack’s thumb stroked her cheekbone.

“I want to spend time with you, beauty,” he reiterated. “Given your father’s bias
against me, though, I cannot even call on you. I would never be allowed within a half
mile of you.”

“No, you would give him apoplexy,” she answered with a faint smile. She couldn’t let
her father find out that she even knew Lord Jack, let alone succumbed to his scorching
kisses.

“When does your aunt’s house party begin?” he suddenly asked.

Sophie blinked at the abrupt change of subject. “On Tuesday. We are to leave that
morning for her house in the country.”

“Only three days,” he murmured. “What engagements do you have tonight? And for the
next several days?”

“Why do you wish to know?”

“I’ll have to contrive to meet you somehow.”

His declaration set alarm bells ringing in her head. “I cannot conduct a liaison behind
my parents’ back.”

“Well, I’ll be damned if I will sneak around. It isn’t my style. And we are running
out of time. Your aunt’s house party complicates matters decidedly.”

“I don’t like to sneak about either,” Sophie replied sincerely. “But we cannot tryst
in secret.”

“You’ve done it before with your maid. In fact, you are doing it right now. Why not
with me?”

“That is different. Martha needs me.”

“Your future happiness could depend upon it,” Lord Jack insisted.

Her parents’ future happiness
definitely
depended
upon it, Sophie thought regretfully. She didn’t trust herself to indulge in a covert
affair with Lord Jack. With his beguiling appeal, it would be too dangerous. She would
enjoy his company far too much and be tempted to break off with the duke, and then
all her parents’ hopes would be shattered.

Steeling herself, Sophie slowly shook her head. She had never met anyone like Lord
Jack … so full of life, so much
larger
than life. It stood to reason that she would have few defenses against him. But she
absolutely had to get over her fascination with him so she could do her duty.

Apparently he saw her gesture as a rejection, for he took yet another tack. “What
if I were to threaten to expose your visits here? Would you agree to see me then?”

She gazed blankly up at him. “Are you thinking of
blackmailing
me?”

“How else am I to gain any leverage over you?”

She couldn’t help but laugh. Raising her hands to his chest, Sophie pushed him away
while struggling to regain her shaken equilibrium.

As she restored her bonnet to its proper position and tied the ribbons, she countered
with her own threat. “In the first place, you cannot expose my secrets unless you
want me to expose your own. You don’t want anyone knowing of your patronage here,
remember?”

His eyes filled with reluctant amusement as she continued. “And in the second, I don’t
believe you would stoop so low. The kind of man who supports a shelter for needy mothers
would not resort to blackmail.”

“Would I not?”

“No. Particularly regarding an issue that is so personal to you.” Sophie cocked her
head as she studied him. “The other night you said you knew someone who could have
benefited from a refuge like Arundel. I believe I can guess whom you meant—and why
you champion the vulnerable women here. It’s because your own mother found herself
in a similar predicament all those years ago, isn’t it?”

The humor in his eyes promptly faded. “I don’t wish to discuss it.”

She could tell she had touched a nerve, so she left off prodding him. “Very well,
but I think your image of being an uncaring rake is a sham.”

Lord Jack made no comment, only ran a hand roughly through his raven hair. She could
tell he was frustrated because they were at an impasse. Perhaps he was merely spoiled;
as the privileged son of a nobleman, he was surely accustomed to getting his own way.

Or perhaps it was something deeper.

He was a charming rogue, true, but she had caught a fleeting glimpse of a different
man entirely, hidden beneath the façade. A serious, contemplative,
complex
man teeming with emotional undercurrents inside. There was an intensity about Lord
Jack that was totally unexpected … and totally compelling.

As the silence drew out, Sophie saw a muscle work in his jaw. But then abruptly, without
warning, he gave in. “Very well … you win.”

Her glance turned skeptical. She hadn’t thought he would relent so easily. “What do
I win?”

“Never mind.”

Grasping her elbow, he guided her to the door and
ushered her from the office. “Come, I will escort you to your carriage.”

Sophie’s steps lagged. “I would rather you didn’t.”

“Why not? Because you don’t want your aunt to know I am associating with you?”

His perceptiveness impressed her. “Yes, but not for the reason you think. If she knew
you are proposing a clandestine rendezvous with me, she would only encourage you.”

His brows drew together thoughtfully, as if he found her admission intriguing. “Indeed?”

“Yes. For some reason my Aunt Eunice likes your boldness.” Sophie laughed softly in
remembrance. “She especially admired your gall in infiltrating her ball.”

“So we would have an ally in her?”

That he wanted an ally surprised and flattered Sophie. “Well … perhaps. As it happens,
she doesn’t share my parents’ desire that I wed Dunmore. But her support would make
no difference to my father.”

Lord Jack was silent as he walked Sophie outside to the graveled drive where her aunt’s
carriage waited.

Opening the barouche door, he handed her inside, then startled her with his next words.
“I will see you tomorrow, Miss Fortin, if not before.”

Sophie sent him an exasperated look. “Did you not hear a word I said?”

“Oh, I heard every word. But I don’t want your being sold into matrimony on my conscience
when I could have stopped it.” He grinned in that slow, deliberately maddening way
of his. “And since there is little time left, I will simply have to go around your
father.”

“What do you mean, go around him? What do you intend to do?”

In response, he only smiled enigmatically and stepped back, then shut the carriage
door and rapped on the panel, giving her aunt’s coachman the office to start.

His refusal to answer her worried Sophie greatly. As the barouche rolled away, she
turned in her seat to gaze back at Lord Jack through the small rear window, but he
had disappeared from sight.

She caught her lower lip with her teeth, wondering if she ought to return and try
to reason with him further. But she knew it would be futile.

And one thing she also knew: She hadn’t heard the last of Lord Jack Wilde. That was
for certain.

He was losing
the battle against desire, Jack acknowledged as he watched the barouche roll away.
Before this moment, he’d never spent time contemplating the power in a kiss, but his
second delectable encounter with Sophie Fortin had settled the issue for him: There
truly was something special between them.

The riveting sweetness of her mouth had only made him want her more. And given the
looming house party, he felt the urgency to act.

His immediate priority, Jack decided, was to cultivate an ally in Sophie’s great-aunt,
Mrs. Eunice Pennant. That goal brought him once again to the Pennant residence, late
the next morning. Since it was Sunday, the street was quiet, as was the interior of
the house when he was admitted.

In hushed tones, the butler promised to inquire if Mrs. Pennant was receiving and
showed Jack to a parlor to wait.

He was left cooling his heels for nearly a quarter of an hour before the servant returned
and escorted him
upstairs to an elegant sitting room. Jack found the elderly lady seated in a plush
velvet chair. Her silver hair and stooped posture made her appear fragile with age,
but her blue eyes sparkled with curiosity and interest as he sketched her a polite
bow.

“Forgive me for not descending the stairs to receive you, Lord Jack,” Mrs. Pennant
said in greeting, “but my old bones strongly object to movement at this ungodly time
of day. What brings you here? I confess astonishment that you would show your face
here, given the rift between the Wildes and the Fortins.”

“I came to retrieve my cutlass, ma’am. I mistakenly left it in your library the night
of your masquerade.”

She stared at him for upward of ten seconds before letting out a cackle of laughter,
which had the unfortunate effect of inducing a coughing fit.

Quickly going down on one knee beside her, Jack snatched up an embroidered handkerchief
lying on a side table and pressed it into her hand.

Mrs. Pennant wheezed into the cloth for another few moments, then dabbed her damp
eyes as she observed him with obvious amusement. “Leave it to you to do the unexpected,
my lord. No, you needn’t worry. I am not in danger of expiring.” She waved him to
a chair. “You have some nerve, returning to the scene of the crime, as it were.”

Jack grinned, knowing he had negotiated his first major hurdle. Instead of throwing
him out on his ear, Sophie’s great-aunt seemed eager to learn why he had called. But
winning over this crotchety lady would not be easy.

“I have come to make you a proposition, Mrs. Pennant. I understand you are planning
a house party in
Berkshire this week in order to sweeten up the Duke of Dunmore.”

Her gaze narrowed. “You are a frank one, aren’t you?”

“You are known for your plain-speaking yourself,” Jack countered.

“I am. I fancy directness over mealymouth bromides. Therefore, pray be direct.”

“Do I understand correctly that you don’t want your niece to wed Dunmore?”

She hesitated but eventually nodded. “You could say so.”

“Then I wish to make my case for why you should grant me permission to court her.”

“
Indeed
?” Astonishment spread over Mrs. Pennant’s wrinkled features. “Are you telling me
you want to
wed
my niece?”

Jack answered honestly. “I don’t yet know if matrimony is in the cards. We only met
just this week.”

“So you are not claiming to love her.”

“I admit I am enamored of her, but I don’t know her well enough yet to love her, and
it is too soon to tell if a courtship could lead to marriage. But I want the chance
for us to become better acquainted and determine if we could be a match … which is
why I am requesting an invitation to your house party.”

Her rasping laugh sounded again. “You are inventive, I’ll give you that. I presume
you will tell me why I should invite you.”

“Because time is running short for me to win your niece’s affections before Dunmore
proposes.”